Music: Marcia Ball still shines bright

By Jay N. Miller/For The Patriot Ledger

Wednesday

Aug 8, 2018 at 2:56 PMAug 9, 2018 at 9:53 AM

Earlier this year the Texas state Legislature voted Marcia Ball the official 2018 Texas State Musician and in October she'll be inducted into the Austin City Limits Hall of Fame along with Los Lobos and Ray Charles.

It is heady stuff, but it's not like she's an overnight sensation as Ball is also celebrating her 50th year in the music business, the past 38 as leader of her own band. Ball has also just released an album, "Shine Bright" (on Alligator Records), her 14th overall, and one of the most effervescent of her typically rollicking and infectious outings.

"Rollicking is the word that everyone seems to like to describe my music," Ball said, laughing from her Austin home this week.

Ball will be headlining the City Winery in Boston on Friday August 17. City Winery.

Ball's music has always been an intoxicating combination of roots music, from boogie-woogie to swampy rock to Texas blues but with a straight line of New Orleans gumbo influences. Ball will tell you seeing a concert by New Orleans piano icon Irma Thomas when she just 13 years old set her on a path to a music career. Just as Thomas' music, or that of Professor Longhair, the seminal New Orleans piano player, always seems to be upbeat and infectious and prone to forcing listeners to have happy feet, Ball's own music is also a cornucopia of good times.

Ball studied at Louisiana State University and played in some bands there. She set out in 1970 for San Francisco as a 21-year old musician with big dreams. In an almost apocryphal story, her car broke down in Austin and while waiting for it to be fixed she fell in love with the city's musical culture and basically never left. Ball was part of the band Freda and the Firedogs for a few years, but by 1978 she was releasing her debut album, "Circuit Queen," on Capitol Records. Over the years she moved to New England's Rounder Records and since 2001 has been on Alligator, the premier blues label based in Chicago. Along the way, she's garnered 10 Blues Music Awards, 10 Living Blues Awards, five Grammy nominations, and was elected to the Gulf Coast Music Hall of Fame as well as the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame. This week, Living Blues magazine announced Ball had won her 11th Living Blues Award, winning their Readers Poll as Outstanding Musician – keyboards.

"Well, when I saw Irma Thomas that time I did want to do that, but I never imagined I could do it," Ball said. "I was just 18 when that first garage band was born and then one thing led to another and then another in a series of lucky turns. I think, with Irma Thomas and Professor Longhair, and all those type of people who influenced me, the overriding influence on me as a songwriter has been (New Orleans producer/musician/songwriter) Allen Toussaint. Allen's distillation of that music and his dedication to carrying on Professor Longhair's legacy is probably the most unifying factor in my own music. But it's basically the sound of Louisiana and that's what I've always loved."

The dozen songs on the new album include nine originals and three notable covers, from Ray Charles, Jesse Winchester and New Orleans legend Ernie K-Doe. But there are two of the originals that seem to serve as the touchstones for this album, the title cut and "Pots and Pans." The title cut, "Shine Bright," is an anthem to getting involved, to getting out and standing up for yourself, your community, your beliefs. "Pots and Pans," similarly, celebrates those who do make things happen, particularly women, with lines like "It's our voice ... it's our choice." The late, great, comic writer and commentator Molly Ivins, was part of the inspiration for "Pots and Pans."

"The three cover songs all come from people who were very influential in my musical world," Ball noted. "That Jesse Winchester song ("Take A Little Louisiana") is what led me to go to Louisiana to record some of this album. An old friend, who had signed me to Capitol back in the 1970s, sent me a Jesse Winchester song, feeling it'd be good for me to record. He has great instinct for music and while the one he sent me was not the one we used, it did turn me on to the album it had been on, which is where I found 'Take A Little Louisiana.'

"I think there are three songs that kind of represent the theme to this record," Ball explained. "Shine Bright,' 'Pots and Pans' and 'World Full of Love.' The weirder things get in the world, the more I try to address issues. 'Pots and Pans' is pretty in-your-face, but mainly with all three of those songs I was trying to be encouraging and hopeful. I want people to form action groups where they see change is needed. With a song like 'Pots and Pans,' I'm trying to really address the deterioration of our moral core, and get people to stand up for moral leadership."

The new album was produced by Steve Berlin of Los Lobos and it features a variety of arrangements, from the horn-fired r&b of "When the Mardi Gras Is Over" and "Pots and Pans," to the more stripped down quintet of "Life of the Party," the gospel harmonies of "World Full of Love," and the swampy bayou octet of "Take a Little Louisiana."

"Steve Berlin is great to work with, and we like to discuss all kinds of approaches," Ball explained. "I have things in mind and Steve likes to do many different things and the best part is that we have all these arrangers, vocalists and musicians at the tip of our fingers – on speed dial. For this record I wanted to go to Louisiana, where we worked at the legendary Dockside Studios for four songs, with Eric Adcock putting those sessions together. I had that one song, 'Take A Little Louisiana,' for instance, where I wanted my friends Roddie Romero and Yvette Landry to sing on it with me, and Eric made it happen. Eric produced Buckwheat Zydeco's Grammy-winning album, so collaborating with him and all those people was a wonderful experience."

The new album's originals also include several co-writes with Ball combining with noted r&b/country songsmith Gary Nicholson on two cuts, with her band guitarist Michael Schermer on 'Life of the Party,' with Kimmie Rhodes on 'World Full of Love,' and with Shelley King and Tim Cook on "When the Mardi Gras Is Over."

"I have worked a lot with Gary Nicholson, and he produced my 'Roadside Attractions' album from a few years back," Ball pointed out. "Working with him is easy – a song WILL be written. I call him 'Relentless.' But I had in mind what this record would be about, and he helped me do those two songs. Mike Schermer, on the other hand, came over when I was in the doldrums temporarily with my writing, and he had the idea for 'Life of the Party.' But his version had it 'you can't be the life of the party,' and I said, 'of course you can,' so we changed it around to make it a more positive, upbeat tune.

"Kimmie Rhodes is a very successful songwriter, who also has a beautiful voice," Ball said. "We set out to write a song about hopefulness, the way we want to feel. We wrote it as a duet right from the start, and when we recorded it we added Kimmie's daughter Jolie for that three-part harmony."